


people eat bread

by Sotong_sotong



Category: Tsubasa: Reservoir Chronicle
Genre: Angst, Blood Drinking, Introspection, M/M, consent issues towards Fai's feeding, small mentions of violence, this is basically set sometime in Infinity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-08
Updated: 2016-09-08
Packaged: 2018-08-13 21:23:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7986682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sotong_sotong/pseuds/Sotong_sotong
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Perhaps, when they’re actually stripped bare, the man will look-- <i>really</i> look at Fai, and he’ll understand why Fai can never be a part of an <i>us</i>, that his body is a hollow, supported by webs of lies sticking to his insides in some farcical effort to keep him from collapsing altogether ever since half of him fell out of a tower and left him behind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	people eat bread

**Author's Note:**

> I am not mad  
> I am not mad any longer  
> People eat tomatoes  
> People eat bread  
> I am a monster  
> I eat life. 
> 
> — Dorothea Lasky from “Who to Tell”

_Question_ : What is the colour of acceptance?

 

Fai thinks that it could be red; to be quite honest, it could be anything really, but his eyes track the droplets of blood crawling past Kurogane’s wrist and in its sheen he finds only one answer: it is _red_.

He licks his lips, allows his gaze to flicker between the cut and the firm set of the ninja’s impassive face, and for all it’s worth, time could stop now and Fai might still like to kiss all that off, might still harbour a darker _need_ to flick his fingers and grow out his claws, only to dig them into Kurogane’s temples, so he can finally peel that _frustrating_ veneer of stubbornness away and yell at whatever’s left inside; perhaps, beneath the layers, Kurogane, too, is scared, and perhaps, Fai is greedy for that validation.

Perhaps, when they’re actually stripped bare, the man will look-- _really_ look at Fai, and he’ll understand why Fai can never be a part of an _us_ , that his body is a hollow, supported by webs of lies sticking to his insides in some farcical effort to keep him from collapsing altogether ever since half of him fell out of a tower and left him behind.

( Nothing about him is pretty at all, if Fai is ever brave enough to let slip the fine print, and he wonders if Kurogane would be as steadfast then. )

Kurogane clears his throat, even goes so far as to dare quirk an eyebrow at him as he lifts his bleeding wrist higher, obviously prodding: _get the hell on with it._

“Pushy,” Fai snaps, and just for the satisfaction of being the first to rub salt into wounds— he no longer cares whose at this point —he smiles with no warmth, glibly pointing out, “Never thought I’d see the day you’d try to spoonfeed someone, but here we are.”

He doesn’t miss the way the ninja’s shoulders had jerked at that, and counts it as a victory, however small it is, because Fai always loses to the bigger picture anyway: the motion causes a crimson glob to teeter ever so dangerously on the edge of Kurogane’s skin, threatening to make a wasted descent.

His mouth is upon it before he can make sense of anything else.

“Oh,” Fai breathes. _I didn’t mean to do that._

Warm fingers card through his fringe, and they tip his face closer towards more blood. Kurogane’s voice is barely above a whisper, coloured by weariness stemmed from tired hopes, and maybe what he says is a plea; Fai sort of wishes it isn’t. He isn’t a wish granter like Yuuko-san. “Stop making it so hard for yourself. Just drink.” _Just try to live— please._

This close to each other, Fai’s throat _aches_ , every second of restraint slides past like sandpaper, rubbing him raw of the will to refuse as each fang sharpens, poking at his bottom lip, but this is not how he wants to fall ~~again~~. “What if I don’t?” _What if I never wanted to in the first place?_

“Then, it’s your loss.” Kurogane turns his face away and the planes of his face dip into shadows casted by the dim light bulb overhead; a Rorschach in the lesson of patience; of quiet yearning. _Then, I’ll be the one to change it, to change you._

“Mine, not _yours_ ,” Fai mutters, resigned, trying to sting a steel wall. The other man snorts, all water off a duck’s back, and the fight escapes Fai incrementally, in slow puffs like smoke trailing from a _kiseru_ pipe. When his teeth sinks, he glances, quickly, up. _This is not going to be always, not me giving in._

Unfortunately, Kurogane doesn’t have to say a thing, because Fai knows, tiredly so, that of all the hues it could be, the colour of acceptance is most likely red.

(Which he drinks and he sheds, unreservedly.)

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading!


End file.
